| 2006 || May || Review || Google releases [[wikipedia:Google Trends|Google Trends]] to make it easy to visualize the popularity of searches over time.<ref name=official-google-history/>

| 2006 || May || Review || Google releases [[wikipedia:Google Trends|Google Trends]] to make it easy to visualize the popularity of searches over time.<ref name=official-google-history/>

+

|-

+

| 2006 || August 23 || Customized search || Google publicly launches {{w|Google Custom Search}}. The main part of this is Custom Search Engine, a functionality that allows users to build search engines with their own custom modifications of Google Search, specifically, restriction of the search queries to a subset of the web (e.g., a specific set of domains).<ref>{{cite web|title=The Power of Google Search is Now Customizable|url=http://googlepress.blogspot.com/2006/10/power-of-google-search-is-now_23.html|publisher=Google|date = August 23, 2006|accessdate = July 13, 2019}}</ref>

| 2010 || December 1 || Search algorithm update || Google updated its algorithm to penalize websites that provided a bad experience to users. The update is prompted by a November 26 ''[[wikipedia:New York Times|New York Times]]'' story about a fraudulent company called DecorMyEyes that used the publicity generated by negative customer reviews to rise in the search engine rankings.<ref name=moz/><ref>{{cite web|url=http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/being-bad-to-your-customers-is-bad-for.html|title = Being bad to your customers is bad for business|date = December 1, 2010|accessdate = February 2, 2014|publisher = Official Google Blog|last = Singhal|first = Amit|authorlink = Amit Singhal}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/28/business/28borker.html?_r=2&pagewanted=all&|title = A Bully Finds a Pulpit on the Web|last = Segal|first = David|date = November 26, 2010|accessdate = February 2, 2014|publisher = ''[[wikipedia:New York Times|New York Times]]''}}</ref>

+

| 2010 || December 1 || Search algorithm update || Google updates its algorithm to penalize websites that provide a bad experience to users. The update is prompted by a November 26 ''[[wikipedia:New York Times|New York Times]]'' story about a fraudulent company called DecorMyEyes that used the publicity generated by negative customer reviews to rise in the search engine rankings.<ref name=moz/><ref>{{cite web|url=http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/being-bad-to-your-customers-is-bad-for.html|title = Being bad to your customers is bad for business|date = December 1, 2010|accessdate = February 2, 2014|publisher = Official Google Blog|last = Singhal|first = Amit|authorlink = Amit Singhal}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/28/business/28borker.html?_r=2&pagewanted=all&|title = A Bully Finds a Pulpit on the Web|last = Segal|first = David|date = November 26, 2010|accessdate = February 2, 2014|publisher = ''[[wikipedia:New York Times|New York Times]]''}}</ref>

| 2015 || October 26 || Search algorithm update (announcement/confirmation) || Google announces that [[wikipedia:RankBrain|RankBrain]], a [[wikipedia:machine learning|machine learning]]-based engine (using [[wikipedia:neural network|neural network]]s), has been the third most influential factor in its search rankings for the last few months. The actual rollout date is not confirmed, but commentators pin the launch time to Spring 2015. It is most useful for new search queries, that account for about 15% of search queries.<ref name=moz/><ref>{{cite web|url = https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-26/google-turning-its-lucrative-web-search-over-to-ai-machines|title = Google Turning Its Lucrative Web Search Over to AI Machines|publisher = ''[[wikipedia:Bloomberg News|Bloomberg News]]''|date = October 26, 2015|accessdate = September 12, 2016|last = Clark|first = Jack}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url = https://techcrunch.com/2016/06/04/artificial-intelligence-is-changing-seo-faster-than-you-think/|title = Artificial intelligence is changing SEO faster than you think|last = Rampton|first = John|date = June 4, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016}}</ref>

+

| 2015 || October 26 || Search algorithm update (announcement/confirmation) || Google announces that {{w|RankBrain}}, a {{w|machine learning}}-based engine (using {{w|neural network}}s), has been the third most influential factor in its search rankings for the last few months. The actual rollout date is not confirmed, but commentators pin the launch time to Spring 2015. It is most useful for new search queries, that account for about 15% of search queries.<ref name=moz/><ref>{{cite web|url = https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-26/google-turning-its-lucrative-web-search-over-to-ai-machines|title = Google Turning Its Lucrative Web Search Over to AI Machines|publisher = ''[[wikipedia:Bloomberg News|Bloomberg News]]''|date = October 26, 2015|accessdate = September 12, 2016|last = Clark|first = Jack}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url = https://techcrunch.com/2016/06/04/artificial-intelligence-is-changing-seo-faster-than-you-think/|title = Artificial intelligence is changing SEO faster than you think|last = Rampton|first = John|date = June 4, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016}}</ref>

|-

|-

| 2015 || November 19 || Transparency (quality raters guidelines) || Google releases the full versions of its search quality raters guidelines (QRG), a 160-page-long handbook that it previously only gave human evaluators to rate websites. The guidelines help websites understand what qualities Google Search would like to see in websites, although ratings made by raters based on these guidelines do not directly change search engine rankings. The release follows a leak in October 2015 of the same guidelines<ref name=qrg-release>{{cite web|url = https://searchengineland.com/google-releases-the-full-version-of-their-search-quality-rating-guidelines-236572|title = Google Releases The Full Version Of Their Search Quality Rating Guidelines. For the first time, Google has released the full version of its Search Quality Raters guidelines and handbook. It is 160 pages of wonderful SEO knowledge.|date = November 19, 2015|accessdate = January 20, 2019|publisher = Search Engine Land}}</ref> Two important pieces of jargon that gain currency in the SEO world due to these guidelines are: YMYL (your money or your life), a term for websites that offer information or allow people to take actions that have the potential to negatively impact the end user's health and wealth (examples include sites related to e-commerce, financial advice, medical advice, and legal advice), and E-A-T (expertise, authoritativeness, and trust), factors that are important to Google Search for ranking sites, and even more important for YMYL sites.<ref>{{cite web|url = https://moz.com/blog/google-search-quality-raters-guidelines|title = 30+ Important Takeaways from Google's Search Quality Rater's Guidelines|last = Slegg|first = Jennifer|date = November 25, 2015|accessdate = January 20, 2019|publisher = SEOMoz}}</ref>

| 2015 || November 19 || Transparency (quality raters guidelines) || Google releases the full versions of its search quality raters guidelines (QRG), a 160-page-long handbook that it previously only gave human evaluators to rate websites. The guidelines help websites understand what qualities Google Search would like to see in websites, although ratings made by raters based on these guidelines do not directly change search engine rankings. The release follows a leak in October 2015 of the same guidelines<ref name=qrg-release>{{cite web|url = https://searchengineland.com/google-releases-the-full-version-of-their-search-quality-rating-guidelines-236572|title = Google Releases The Full Version Of Their Search Quality Rating Guidelines. For the first time, Google has released the full version of its Search Quality Raters guidelines and handbook. It is 160 pages of wonderful SEO knowledge.|date = November 19, 2015|accessdate = January 20, 2019|publisher = Search Engine Land}}</ref> Two important pieces of jargon that gain currency in the SEO world due to these guidelines are: YMYL (your money or your life), a term for websites that offer information or allow people to take actions that have the potential to negatively impact the end user's health and wealth (examples include sites related to e-commerce, financial advice, medical advice, and legal advice), and E-A-T (expertise, authoritativeness, and trust), factors that are important to Google Search for ranking sites, and even more important for YMYL sites.<ref>{{cite web|url = https://moz.com/blog/google-search-quality-raters-guidelines|title = 30+ Important Takeaways from Google's Search Quality Rater's Guidelines|last = Slegg|first = Jennifer|date = November 25, 2015|accessdate = January 20, 2019|publisher = SEOMoz}}</ref>

|-

|-

−

| 2016 || February 3 || Team || [[wikipedia:Amit Singhal|Amit Singhal]] steps down from his position as Vice President of Search at Google after 15 years in that role. He is replaced by John Giannandrea who works in artificial intelligence at Alphabet, Google's parent company.<ref>{{cite web|url = https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/technology/amit-singhal-an-influential-engineer-at-google-will-retire.html|title = Amit Singhal, an Influential Engineer at Google, Will Retire|last = Hardy|first = Quentin|date = February 3, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url = http://searchengineland.com/amit-singhal-the-head-of-google-search-to-leave-the-company-for-philanthropic-purposes-241707|title = Amit Singhal, The Head Of Google Search, To Leave The Company For Philanthropic Purposes. After 15 years, Google's head of search, Amit Singhal, is leaving the company.|last = Schwartz|first = Barry|publisher = [[wikipedia:Search Engine Land|Search Engine Land]]|date = February 3, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016}}</ref>

+

| 2016 || February 3 || Team || [[wikipedia:Amit Singhal|Amit Singhal]] steps down from his position as Vice President of Search at Google after 15 years in that role. He is replaced by John Giannandrea who works in artificial intelligence at Alphabet, Google's parent company.<ref>{{cite web|url = https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/technology/amit-singhal-an-influential-engineer-at-google-will-retire.html|title = Amit Singhal, an Influential Engineer at Google, Will Retire|last = Hardy|first = Quentin|date = February 3, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url = http://searchengineland.com/amit-singhal-the-head-of-google-search-to-leave-the-company-for-philanthropic-purposes-241707|title = Amit Singhal, The Head Of Google Search, To Leave The Company For Philanthropic Purposes. After 15 years, Google's head of search, Amit Singhal, is leaving the company.|last = Schwartz|first = Barry|publisher = [[wikipedia:Search Engine Land|Search Engine Land]]|date = February 3, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016}}</ref> There is speculation that this will lead to more incorporation of machine learning and AI techniques in Google Search.<ref>{{cite web|url = https://marketingland.com/google-machines-running-the-search-162564|title = What’s Next, As Google’s Head Of Search Leaves & Its Machine Learning Chief Takes Over? After 15 years, Google search chief Amit Singhal is moving on. In his place, machine learning head John Giannandrea is taking over. The rise of the machines?|last = Sullivan|first = Danny|date = February 3, 2016|accessdate = July 13, 2019|publisher = Marketing Land}}</ref>

|-

|-

| 2016 || February 18 and 23 || Advertising || Google makes changes to [[wikipedia:Google AdWords|Google AdWords]], removing right-column ads and rolling out 4-ad top blocks on searches with commercial intent. The change has implications on organic search CTRs for such searches, since it pushes the organic search results further down the page, potentially reducing organic search CTRs.<ref>{{cite web|url = http://searchengineland.com/googles-new-serp-layout-4-biggest-winners-losers-based-data-243292|title = Google’s New SERP Layout: The Biggest Winners & Losers. What has been the impact of Google's new desktop ad layout thus far? Columnist Larry Kim uses data to show who has benefited and who has suffered from the change.|last = Kim|first = Larry|date = February 24, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016|publisher = [[wikipedia:Search Engine Land|Search Engine Land]]}}</ref> Up to three additional ads may be shown below the 10 organic search results, and additional ads may be shown on the second page.<ref name=moz/><ref name=moz-4-ads>{{cite web|url = https://moz.com/blog/four-ads-on-top-the-wait-is-over|title = Four Ads on Top: The Wait Is Over|last = Meyers|first = Peter J.|date = February 19, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016}}</ref><ref name=wordstream-4-ads>{{cite web|url = http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2016/02/22/google-kills-off-right-side-ads|title = Google Kills Off Side Ads: What You Need to Know|last = Kim|first = Larry|date = February 23, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016|publisher = WordStream}}</ref><ref name=wordstream-4-ads-2>{{Cite web|url = http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2016/03/10/takeaways-from-serp-change|title = 3 Weeks After Google Killed Side Ads, Here Are 5 More Takeaways|last = Sagin|first = Erin|date = March 10, 2016|accessdate = September 13, 2016|publisher = WordStream}}</ref>

| 2016 || February 18 and 23 || Advertising || Google makes changes to [[wikipedia:Google AdWords|Google AdWords]], removing right-column ads and rolling out 4-ad top blocks on searches with commercial intent. The change has implications on organic search CTRs for such searches, since it pushes the organic search results further down the page, potentially reducing organic search CTRs.<ref>{{cite web|url = http://searchengineland.com/googles-new-serp-layout-4-biggest-winners-losers-based-data-243292|title = Google’s New SERP Layout: The Biggest Winners & Losers. What has been the impact of Google's new desktop ad layout thus far? Columnist Larry Kim uses data to show who has benefited and who has suffered from the change.|last = Kim|first = Larry|date = February 24, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016|publisher = [[wikipedia:Search Engine Land|Search Engine Land]]}}</ref> Up to three additional ads may be shown below the 10 organic search results, and additional ads may be shown on the second page.<ref name=moz/><ref name=moz-4-ads>{{cite web|url = https://moz.com/blog/four-ads-on-top-the-wait-is-over|title = Four Ads on Top: The Wait Is Over|last = Meyers|first = Peter J.|date = February 19, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016}}</ref><ref name=wordstream-4-ads>{{cite web|url = http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2016/02/22/google-kills-off-right-side-ads|title = Google Kills Off Side Ads: What You Need to Know|last = Kim|first = Larry|date = February 23, 2016|accessdate = September 12, 2016|publisher = WordStream}}</ref><ref name=wordstream-4-ads-2>{{Cite web|url = http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2016/03/10/takeaways-from-serp-change|title = 3 Weeks After Google Killed Side Ads, Here Are 5 More Takeaways|last = Sagin|first = Erin|date = March 10, 2016|accessdate = September 13, 2016|publisher = WordStream}}</ref>

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|-

|-

| 2017 || January 10 || Search algorithm update (ranking) || Google announces that it will crack down on intrusive interstitials on mobile web pages, such as popups that cover the main content, standalone interstitials that the user has to dismiss, and above-the-fold content that looks like an interstitial.<ref name=moz/><ref>{{cite web|url = https://www.seroundtable.com/google-intrusive-interstitials-mobile-penalty-now-rolling-out-23237.html|title = Official: Google Intrusive Interstitials Mobile Penalty Now Rolling Out|date = January 11, 2017|accessdate = January 20, 2019|publisher = Search Engine Roundtable}}</ref> The plan to introduce this penalty was announced in August 2016.<ref name=searchengineland-interstitial>{{cite web|url = https://searchengineland.com/interstitialgeddon-google-warns-will-crack-intrusive-interstitials-next-january-257252|title = Google warns it will crack down on “intrusive interstitials” in January. Google will reinforce its emphasis on the mobile search experience with a new penalty affecting "intrusive interstitials" on mobile web pages.|last = Schwartz|first = Barry|date = August 23, 2016|publisher = Search Engine Land|accessdate = January 20, 2019}}</ref>

| 2017 || January 10 || Search algorithm update (ranking) || Google announces that it will crack down on intrusive interstitials on mobile web pages, such as popups that cover the main content, standalone interstitials that the user has to dismiss, and above-the-fold content that looks like an interstitial.<ref name=moz/><ref>{{cite web|url = https://www.seroundtable.com/google-intrusive-interstitials-mobile-penalty-now-rolling-out-23237.html|title = Official: Google Intrusive Interstitials Mobile Penalty Now Rolling Out|date = January 11, 2017|accessdate = January 20, 2019|publisher = Search Engine Roundtable}}</ref> The plan to introduce this penalty was announced in August 2016.<ref name=searchengineland-interstitial>{{cite web|url = https://searchengineland.com/interstitialgeddon-google-warns-will-crack-intrusive-interstitials-next-january-257252|title = Google warns it will crack down on “intrusive interstitials” in January. Google will reinforce its emphasis on the mobile search experience with a new penalty affecting "intrusive interstitials" on mobile web pages.|last = Schwartz|first = Barry|date = August 23, 2016|publisher = Search Engine Land|accessdate = January 20, 2019}}</ref>

+

|-

+

| 2017 || February 21 || Customized search || Google announces that it is deprecating Google Site Search, its offering for websites that offers a highly site-customized site search solution. Starting April 1, 2017, it will discontinue sales of Google Site Search. The product will be completely shut down by April 1, 2018.<ref>{{cite web|url = https://searchengineland.com/google-sunset-google-site-search-product-recommends-ad-supported-custom-search-engine-269834|title = Google to sunset Google Site Search by end of 2017. Google is telling their Site Search customers they have to find a new internal search engine service.|last = Schwartz|first = Barry|date = February 21, 2017|accessdate = July 13, 2019}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url = https://support.google.com/customsearch/answer/72325?hl=en|title = About Google Site Search|accessdate = May 28, 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url = https://blog.algolia.com/google-site-search-alternative/|title = Algolia: Picking up where Google Site Search left off|last = Utard|first = Sylvain|date = March 2, 2017|accessdate = May 28, 2017|publisher = Algolia}}</ref>

|-

|-

| 2017 || April 25 || Search algorithm update (presentation), incorporation of user feedback || Google announces quality improvements to search and more direct feedback options for users for search results and Featured Snippets (the new, official name for what the SEO community had previously called "answer boxes").<ref>{{cite web|url = https://blog.google/products/search/our-latest-quality-improvements-search/|title = Our latest quality improvements for Search|date = April 25, 2017|last = Gomes|first = Ben}}</ref>

| 2017 || April 25 || Search algorithm update (presentation), incorporation of user feedback || Google announces quality improvements to search and more direct feedback options for users for search results and Featured Snippets (the new, official name for what the SEO community had previously called "answer boxes").<ref>{{cite web|url = https://blog.google/products/search/our-latest-quality-improvements-search/|title = Our latest quality improvements for Search|date = April 25, 2017|last = Gomes|first = Ben}}</ref>

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==References==

==References==

−

{{reflist|2}}

+

{{reflist|30em}}

Latest revision as of 07:16, 13 July 2019

The content on this page is forked from the English Wikipedia page entitled "Timeline of Google Search". The original page still exists at Timeline of Google Search. The original content was released under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License (CC-BY-SA), so this page inherits this license. This page has been edited significantly on the Timelines Wiki after forking and may differ significantly from the current version on Wikipedia.

Google Search, offered by Google, is the most widely used search engine on the World Wide Web as of 2014, with over three billion searches a day. This page covers key events in the history of Google's search service.

For a history of Google the company, including all of Google's products, acquisitions, and corporate changes, see the history of Google page.

Google starts using web histories to help in searches (2005), experimentally launches social search (2009), and launches Search Plus Your World (2012).

2009–2010

Caffeine update for faster indexing of the web and fresher and on-topic search results.

2011–2014

Google Panda (an update to some parts of Google's search algorithm) is released in 2011, with announced updates continuing till September 2014 (Panda 4.1). Stated goals include cracking down on spam, content farms, scrapers, and websites with a high ad-to-content ratio.

2012–2014

Google Penguin (an update to some parts of Google's search algorithm) is released in 2012, with the goal of concentrating on webspam. The last named update is in October 2014. Starting December 2014, Penguin moves to continuous updates (Penguin Everflux).

Google releases Google Hummingbird, an update that may enable semantic search in the future and integrate better with the Knowledge Graph.

2014 onward

Google makes a major update to its algorithm for local search. The update gets the name Google Pigeon.

2015 onward

Google alerts webmasters to mobile usability issues in January, and announces a major update to its search algorithm, to be rolled out starting April 21, 2015, that will heavily demote mobile-unfriendly sites for web searches on mobile devices.

The first known instance of a Google bomb is reported around this time, with a search for "more evil than Satan itself" bringing up the Microsoft website. The perpetrators of the Google bomb are not known.[6]

A Google bomb is created around this time by Hugedisk Men's Magazine, an online humor magazine, with the search term "dumb motherfucker" linked to a website selling George W. Bush merchandise. A similar attempt for an Al Gore website is not successful.[8][9]

Adam Mathes coins the term talentless hack. He creates a Google bomb for the term "talentless hack" to the website of his friend Andy Pressman by recruiting fellow webloggers to link to his friend's page with the desired term.[11]

The Googlefight website (unaffiliated with Google), that allows people to compare results of two search queries on Google, likely launches in this year. It is given permission by Google to use the name sometime during the year.[12]

2002

January 8

The term Googlewhack is introduced by Gary Stock for a search query that has exactly two words, without quotes, and returns exactly one result.[13]

Google makes the first publicly announced update to its search algorithm.[10] A number of Internet commentators view this as the death of PageRank (the name for Google's system for ranking pages) and a significant decline in the quality of Google's search results.[14][15][16]

Google announces the Cassandra update. The update claims to crack down on link spam, including mutual links between co-owned websites, as well as hidden text and hidden links.[10][17]

2003

May

Search algorithm update

Google announces the Dominic update. Commentators believed that the update affected the way backlinks were counted, and many webmasters reported new bots from Google that bounced.[10][18]

2003

June

Search algorithm update

Google announces what will later turn out to have been the last of its regular monthly updates. This update is called the Esmeralda update.[10][19]

2003

July

Search algorithm update

Google announces the Fritz update, and also a change to its update policy, as it moves towards continuous rather than batch processing of updates.[10][20][21]

2003

September

Search algorithm update

Google announces a "supplemental index" in order to be able to index some parts of the web more rapidly.[22] The supplemental index would eventually be scrapped.

2003

November

Search algorithm update

Google announces the Florida update, which commentators consider game-changing in that it completely destroyed the value of 1990s SEO tactics and ushered in a new era of search engine optimization.[23]

Although Google denies running an update, Matt Cutts clarifies that PageRank was refreshed for some pages recently (with a three-month refresh cycle) causing changes to many site ranks. Observers call this the Gilligan update.[10][39][40]

2005

September–November

Search algorithm update

Google announces and rolls out the Jagger update in three stages, one in September, one in October, one in November.[10][41][42]

2005

December (rollout continues till March 2006)

Search algorithm update

Google begins rolling out the Big Daddy update, continuing for the next few months until March 2006. The update changes URL canonization, site redirects, and related items.[10][43]

2006

May

Review

Google releases Google Trends to make it easy to visualize the popularity of searches over time.[5]

2006

August 23

Customized search

Google publicly launches Google Custom Search. The main part of this is Custom Search Engine, a functionality that allows users to build search engines with their own custom modifications of Google Search, specifically, restriction of the search queries to a subset of the web (e.g., a specific set of domains).[44]

2007

May 16

Search algorithm update + user experience

Google launches Universal Search, integrating traditional search results with results from Google News, Google Image Search, Google Video Search, and other verticals. This is believed to be a major milestone in the user experience.[5][10][45][46]

2007

June

Search algorithm update

The Buffy update happens. It is not considered a deliberate update, but rather an accumulation of many smaller changes.[10][47][48]

2008

March 14

Transparency (quality raters guidelines)

For the first time on record, Google's quality raters guidelines are leaked.[49] Updated versions of the guidelines would continue to be leaked for several years until Google finally decides to make the guidelines publicly available in November 2015.[50]

2008

March 24

User experience

The New York Times reports that Google now offers "search within search": when people search for names of websites, the top search result, which links to the website, may include a search box to further search within the website.[51]

2008

March/April

Search algorithm update

The Dewey update seems to lead to a large-scale shuffling of results. Some observers believe that Google is pushing its own properties, such as Google Books, but evidence of this is limited.[10][52]

2008

August 25

User experience

Google Suggest (later called Autocomplete), originally launched as a Labs feature in December 2004, now becomes part of Google's main site.[5][28][29]

2009

February

Search algorithm update

The Vince update happens. Matt Cutts calls it a minor change, but some SEO commentators consider it major.[10][53]

2009

February

Webmaster tools

Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo! announce joint support for tags that help bots identify canonical versions of webpages without affecting human visitors.[54][55]

2009

August 10 (announced), rollout completed and made live June 8, 2010

Search algorithm update

Named Caffeine, this update is announced on August 10, 2009. It promises faster crawling, expansion of the index, and a near-real-time integration of indexing and ranking.[10][56][57][58][59] The rollout is made live on June 8, 2010.[60][61][62]

2009

October 26

Search category

Google introduces Social Search as a Google Labs feature.[63] The feature is expanded further in late January 2010.[64]

The update, named May Day, is an algorithm change affecting the long tail. Foreshadowing Google Panda, the update penalizes sites with large amounts of thin content.[10][67][68]

2010

September 8

User experience

Google launches Google Instant, described as a search-before-you-type feature: as users are typing, Google predicts the user's whole search query (using the same technology as in Google Suggest, later called the autocomplete feature) and instantaneously shows results for the top prediction.[69][70][71] Google claims that this is estimated to save 2–5 seconds per search query.[72] SEO commentators initially believe that this will have a major effect on search engine optimization, but soon revise downward their estimate of the impact.[10][73]

Google updates its algorithm to penalize websites that provide a bad experience to users. The update is prompted by a November 26 New York Times story about a fraudulent company called DecorMyEyes that used the publicity generated by negative customer reviews to rise in the search engine rankings.[10][77][78]

Google launches its Attribution algorithm change to better sieve out websites that scrape content. Matt Cutts claims that slightly over 2% of search queries are affected, but less than 0.5% of results change noticeably.[10][83][84]

2011

February 23–24

Search algorithm update

Google launches Google Panda, a major update affecting 12% of search queries. The update continues with the earlier work of cracking down on spam, content farms, scrapers, and websites with a high ad-to-content ratio.[10][85][86][87] The rollout is gradual over several months, and Panda will see many further updates.

Google rolls out pagination elements for websites to communicate to Google that various webpages are different pages of the same article.[10][106][107]

2011

September 21

Bias concerns in search results

In hearings before the United States Senate, Jeremy Stoppelman of Yelp and Jeffrey Katz of Nextag claim that Google search results are biased against competing offering s such as the reviews on Yelp, while Google still benefits from the information in these reviews. Eric Schmidt of Google claims that Google search results are not biased, and Google aims to offer search results that best meet the needs of users.[108]

2011

September 30

Search algorithm update

Google rolls out Panda 2.5.[10][109] Although the specifics of the update are unclear, a few sites gain significantly and a few others lose significantly.[110] Other minor flux updates occur on October 3, October 5 and October 13, and some commentators call these Panda 3.0 and 3.1.[10][111]

2011

October 18

User experience, SEO data

Google announces that they will start encrypting all search queries for security purposes.[112] This disrupts organic keyword referral data for many websites, making search engine optimization harder.[113]

2011

November 3

Search algorithm update

Google announces a Freshness update that would give priority to fresher, more recent search results, and claims this could affect 35% of search queries.[114][115][116] The algorithm largely affects time-sensitive queries. A number of sites gain and many others lose as a result of the update.[117]

2011

November 14

Search algorithm update

Google announces a 10-pack of updates, and says that this begins a series of monthly announcements of packs of updates.[10][118]

2011

November 18

Search algorithm update

Google releases an allegedly minor Panda update, which SEO commentators label as Panda 3.1, despite the lack of a generally agreed upon update named Panda 3.0.[10][119][120]

2012

December 2011-January 2012 (announced January 5)

Search algorithm update, user experience

A 30-change pack of updates, including landing-page quality detection, more relevant site-links, more rich snippets, and related-query improvements.[121]

Google updates its algorithm to introduce a penalty for websites with too many ads "above the fold". The update has no name, but some SEOs use "Top Heavy" to describe the update.[10][128]

2012

February 27

Search algorithm update

The update, codenamed Venice, is announced as part of Google's end-of-February 40-pack update. Venice seems to give substantially increased weightage to local results (location inferred from the user's IP and other signals) for many search queries, such as those looking for businesses of various types in the vicinity.[10][129][130] On the same date, Google rolls out Panda 3.3, which it bills as a data refresh rather than an algorithm change.[131]

Google starts rolling out Knowledge Graph, used by Google internally to store semantic relationships between objects. Google now begins displaying supplemental information about objects related to search queries on the side.[10][139][140][141]

Moz launches MozCast, the "Google weather report". The tool, available online at mozcast.com, tracks the "temperature" of changes to Google's search algorithm and rankings on a day-to-day basis, helping provide better context to search algorithm changes beyond just the biggest ones.[148][149][150]

2012

August 10

Search algorithm update

Google announces that it will start penalizing websites with repeat copyright infringements, possibly as measured by DMCA takedown requests.[151] Some SEO commentators call this the Pirate update.[152]

2012

September 27

Search algorithm update

Google rolls out a major update to Google Panda (the update is to the underlying algorithm, rather than merely being a data refresh), that would be dubbed Panda 4.0, but SEO commentators decide to simply call it Panda #20. The change is estimated to have affected 2.4% of search queries.[10][153]

2012

September 27

Search algorithm update

Google announces changes in the way it handles Exact-Match Domains. The change is estimated to have affected 0.6% of search queries.[154][155]

2012

October 5

Search algorithm update

Google releases minor tweaks to Penguin, affecting about 0.3% of search queries. SEO commentators call it Penguin #3, following the lead of Panda in ditching the use of 1.x notation in favor of labeling updates by number.[10][156][157]

Google rolls out Panda #25. Remarks by Matt Cutts at SMX West give people the impression that this is the last update to Panda as a distinct entity and it will thereafter be integrated into the core algorithm.[10][162][163] On June 11, 2013, Cutts clarifies that Panda updates roll out over 10-day periods every month and are not continuous.[164]

2013

May 22

Search algorithm update

Google rolls out a new version of Google Penguin that it calls Penguin 2.0, which SEO commentators call Penguin #4.[165][166]

2013

July (or earlier)

Search algorithm update

"Answer boxes" (an early name for featured snippets) are spotted and discussed by SEO experts. These build upon Google's knowledge graph capabilities, to show a box containing the key "answer" to the search query, usually right above the search results. These are distinct from the knowledge graph cards (also known as knowledge cards or knowledge panels) that appear on the right.[167]

2013

August 6

User experience

Google adds a new feature called "in-depth articles" in its search results to feature long-form content of long-lasting value.[10][168][169]

2013

August 21–22 (approximate date for rollout), September 26 (announcement)

Google announces what it calls Penguin 2.1, its fifth version of Penguin, claiming to affect 1% of searches. The effect seems minor.[10][172][173]

2014

May 16

Search algorithm update

Payday Loans 2.0 algorithm change is purely low quality external link related and over-optimization. This specifically goes after high search, spammy queries such as “Payday Loans”. Google is trying to devalue sites that perform in link buying and other black hat methods to game the algorithm.[174]

2014

May 20

Search algorithm update

Panda 4.0 is implemented to devalue sites that contained poor / low quality content. This has been an ongoing battle that Google has been chipping away at for years. Google has claimed that the algorithm change has impacted roughly 7.5% of all search queries.[175]

2014

July 3

Team

Matt Cutts, a Distinguished Engineer at Google who has been heading the web spam team since 2004, goes on leave till October.[176] He later extends his leave through 2015.[177]

2014

July 24

Search algorithm update

Google announces the rollout of Google Pigeon, a major update to its search algorithm for "local" searches such as searches related to events or businesses near one. The Pigeon update gives more weight to various search signals to deliver more relevant local results.[10][178][179]

2014

August 6

Search algorithm update

Google announces search results will give preference to sites using HTTP Secure and SSL encryption. This added ranking signal would be a "lightweight" ranking boost.[180]

2014

August 28

User experience

Google Authorship is removed completely from search results, as already on December 2013 it reduced number of images showing in SERP's. Now it's totally gone to extinction due to lower adaptation rate by authors, to reduce mobile bandwidth and to improve user experience.[10][181][182][183]

2014

September 23 (rollout begins), September 25 (announcement)

Search algorithm update

Google announces that a significant update to Google Panda is rolling out over the next few weeks. The update is dubbed Panda 4.1.[10][184][185] An analysis reveals that the update was heavy on attacking affiliate marketing, keyword stuffing, security warnings, and deception.[186][187]

2014

October 17

Search algorithm update

Penguin 3.0 is implemented as a refresh to re-evaluate sites demoted in the last update due to webspam tactics and demote sites using black hat SEO tactics. This refresh is rolled out globally over several weeks impacting roughly 1% of English-language queries.[10][188]

2014

October 21

Search algorithm update

Pirate 2.0 update dubbed by SEO commentators following the similar update in 2012 which penalized sites deemed as violators of copyright laws. This refresh targets a relatively small number of known sites causing dramatic drops in ranking. In tandem with this Google introduces a new Ad Format for queries where people may be searching for copyrighted media, requiring publishers to purchase ads to promote original content over the unauthorized copies.[10][189][190][191]

Direct action links and expanded text in answer boxes are spotted for searches for content beyond Google's own documentation (in November 2014, these had been spotted but only for Google's own documentation).[194] This leads to further discussion around optimizing for one's content to show up in the answer box.[195] Possibly related: many independent sources report significant fluctuations in Google Search results, but Google does not officially confirm any changes.[10][196]

2015

April 21 (pre-announced February 26)

User experience, search algorithm update (mobile usability)

On January 19, 2015, Google sends emails to webmasters about mobile usability issues on the websites, leading people to speculate that a major mobile usability update for search rankings is underway.[197] On February 26, 2015, Google announces that demotion of mobile-unfriendly sites for searches on mobile devices will commence on April 21, 2015.[198][199][200][201]

2015

May 3

Search algorithm update

Google says it has made a core algorithm change impacting "quality signals". Before the official announcement, commentators had dubbed the changes as "Phantom 2".

2015

July 17

Search algorithm update

Google announces an update to Google Panda, dubbed as Panda 4.2 by commentators. Google says that the change affects between 2% and 3% of search queries. Search engine commentators do not notice any sharp changes to search traffic, and expect the changes to be rolled in gradually.[202][203] By September, it appears that many websites that had seen gains due to Panda 4.2 are seeing those gains reversed.[204]

2015

October 26

Search algorithm update (announcement/confirmation)

Google announces that RankBrain, a machine learning-based engine (using neural networks), has been the third most influential factor in its search rankings for the last few months. The actual rollout date is not confirmed, but commentators pin the launch time to Spring 2015. It is most useful for new search queries, that account for about 15% of search queries.[10][205][206]

2015

November 19

Transparency (quality raters guidelines)

Google releases the full versions of its search quality raters guidelines (QRG), a 160-page-long handbook that it previously only gave human evaluators to rate websites. The guidelines help websites understand what qualities Google Search would like to see in websites, although ratings made by raters based on these guidelines do not directly change search engine rankings. The release follows a leak in October 2015 of the same guidelines[50] Two important pieces of jargon that gain currency in the SEO world due to these guidelines are: YMYL (your money or your life), a term for websites that offer information or allow people to take actions that have the potential to negatively impact the end user's health and wealth (examples include sites related to e-commerce, financial advice, medical advice, and legal advice), and E-A-T (expertise, authoritativeness, and trust), factors that are important to Google Search for ranking sites, and even more important for YMYL sites.[207]

2016

February 3

Team

Amit Singhal steps down from his position as Vice President of Search at Google after 15 years in that role. He is replaced by John Giannandrea who works in artificial intelligence at Alphabet, Google's parent company.[208][209] There is speculation that this will lead to more incorporation of machine learning and AI techniques in Google Search.[210]

2016

February 18 and 23

Advertising

Google makes changes to Google AdWords, removing right-column ads and rolling out 4-ad top blocks on searches with commercial intent. The change has implications on organic search CTRs for such searches, since it pushes the organic search results further down the page, potentially reducing organic search CTRs.[211] Up to three additional ads may be shown below the 10 organic search results, and additional ads may be shown on the second page.[10][212][213][214]

2016

May 12 (announced March 16)

User experience, search algorithm update (mobile usability)

Google rolls out a ranking signal boost to benefit mobile-friendly websites on mobile devices. This is the second update of this sort, with the previous update in April 2015.[10][215][216]

2016

September 1

Search algorithm update

SEO commentators note massive changes to the algorithm for local searches, the biggest since Pigeon. The update is labeled Possum, indicating that some business listings have been filtered rather than actually disappearing. This is attributed to an updated, smarter deduplication algorithm, finer geolocation-awareness, and more decoupling of algorithms used for local search results from the main search results.[10][217] The implications of Possum on local SEO would be discussed for months to come.[218][219][220]

2016

September 23

Search algorithm update

Google announces a Penguin update, and says that Penguin is now part of Google's core ranking algorithm. Commentators dub this Penguin 4.0.[10][221][222] SEOMOz identifies likely dates for phase 1 and phase 2 rollouts as September 27 and October 6.[10]

2017

January 10

Search algorithm update (ranking)

Google announces that it will crack down on intrusive interstitials on mobile web pages, such as popups that cover the main content, standalone interstitials that the user has to dismiss, and above-the-fold content that looks like an interstitial.[10][223] The plan to introduce this penalty was announced in August 2016.[224]

2017

February 21

Customized search

Google announces that it is deprecating Google Site Search, its offering for websites that offers a highly site-customized site search solution. Starting April 1, 2017, it will discontinue sales of Google Site Search. The product will be completely shut down by April 1, 2018.[225][226][227]

Google announces quality improvements to search and more direct feedback options for users for search results and Featured Snippets (the new, official name for what the SEO community had previously called "answer boxes").[228]

2017

late October and November

Search algorithm update (presentation)

Search engine trackers notice a decrease in the percentage of search queries showing featured snippets from ~16% to ~14%, after a mostly steady increase for two years. This is also accompanied by an increase in the percentage of knowledge panels, mostly for the same queries.[10][229][230]

2017

November

Transparency

The Twitter account @searchliaison is created, through which Google's search liaison Danny Sullivan can officially communicate updates related to Google Search algorithm updates. Sullivan would continue to use his own Twitter handle @dannysullivan for updates that are not official communications.[231]

2017

December 1

Search algorithm update (presentation)

Google increases the length of the snippets it includes for each search result.[10][232]

2018

March

Search algorithm update (ranking)

Google makes a core algorithm update that affects the rankings of a number of websites, some positively, some negatively. The update is labeled the "brackets" update by Glenn Gabe. Google as well as SEO commentators say that websites adversely affected should not be looking to make quick fixes, but rather should continue improving their site over the long term.[10][233][234]

2018

March 14

Search algorithm update (presentation)

For one week, Google experiments with defaulting to show no search results for simple queries such as mathematical expressions and date/time lookups, with the search results available through a button that needs to be clicked to show them. Most real-world queries are not affected, but there is discussion of what this experiment means for the future of search.[235]

2018

March 26

Search algorithm update (indexing)

Google announces that it is rolling out its switch to mobile-first indexing at a wider scale; the version of a page that Google will keep in its index and use to make ranking decisions will be the mobile version.[10][236][237]

2018

May 13

Search algorithm update (presentation)

Google reduces the average length of snippets included with each search result from about 300 characters to 150-160 characters, similar to the level prior to the increase in snippet length at the end of November 2017.[10][238]

2018

June 14

Search algorithm update (presentation)

Google moves videos in its desktop search results from organic-like results to a dedicated carousel, and the number of search engine results pages with videos increases significantly.[10] This has unexpected impact on some e-commerce retailers, because videos showing up in carousel mean that the site no longer appears in the organic search results.[239][240]

2018

July 9

Search algorithm update (ranking, mobile usability)

Google finishes rolling out to all users the incorporation of mobile speed into its ranking of webpages. The update affects only extremely slow webpages, and thus does not affect the majority of webpages.[10][241]

Google releases the March 2019 core update, a broad core algorithm update. SEO chatter suggests the update mainly affects YMYL sites, but Google claims that the algorithm is a broad core algorithm update and not targeted at any category.[10][245][246]

2019

April 5 and April 7

Search algorithm update (indexing bug)

Due to a bug, Google seems to drop about 4% of pages from its search index on April 5 and April 7.[10][247]